Chapter 445: Love's Suicide, Asking Again About Sustenance

"Holding you in my hands, devoutly burning incense. Cutting a sliver of candlelight, to light up the scriptures. Not seeking a soul-stirring romance, only seeking to love once. Loving until the end and getting hurt, crying so desperately..."

"Love's Sustenance" is absolutely a good song worth putting on repeat.

As long as you don't listen to it live, Yang Mi's voice, under the training of high-tech "ruthless skills," is unique and narrated with a gentle flow; she doesn't go off-key or miss a beat, possessing a unique charm of its own.

No wonder it held the championship for Baidu song search rankings for over half a year this year, being sung in every street and alley.

No wonder Yang Mi will rely on this song next year to crush Na Ying, Han Hong, and Zhang Liangying at the CCTV-MTV Awards, winning Best Female Singer of the Year, making her fans feel immensely proud whenever they mention it from now on.

Chen Nuo, at an altitude of 30,000 feet, had it on infinite loop in his headphones, and for a moment, he too was intoxicated by the artistic conception of the lyrics.

He hadn't been joking with Yang Mi.

What qualifications did he have to point fingers at Yang Mi?

As a former intimate roommate and current good friend, although, to be honest, he did have some objections to some of Yang Mi's choices in matters over these years.

But could he say it?

No.

If he said too much, it would inevitably change the flavor of things.

He had to maintain distance and uphold the duties of a friend.

Chen Nuo was serious.

He really didn't intend to walk the old path of his past life. Abroad, that was just going with the flow, and sometimes there really was no other way. But domestically, he had made up his mind to keep his zipper under control.

When Liu Yifei sent him off this morning, he could tell the girl was clearly not very happy.

As for the reason, although neither of them said it, it could almost be said to be obvious.

It wasn't just because of another departure, because he wouldn't be gone for long this time; he would definitely be back before the New Year.

Strangely, Chen Nuo actually felt a little bit of guilt in his heart.

You have to know, even when Fan Bingbing gave birth to Fan Ruoruo for him, he could manage to have a clear conscience and be righteous, even taking the initiative in front of Liu Xiaoli, making Liu Ayi swallow her pride.

But Wen Yingshan?

Why?

Yang Mi's voice in the headphones became even more high-pitched.

"I use my whole life and world, to provide you sustenance, only hoping you stop your wandering gaze. Please grant me the infinite power to love and be loved, let me be able to rest easy under the Bodhi tree, quietly contemplating..."

As Yang Mi's former singing partner, Chen Nuo dared to bet that the sound engineer absolutely used every ounce of their strength and life's work at this stage to keep Yang Mi at a fairly stable pitch.

However, although the song was beautiful and pleasant to hear, can the so-called "loving and being loved" really possess infinite power?

"Hello, dear Chen, have you rested well? You've been pretending to sleep for over two hours. We'll be arriving in Hong Kong in a while, can we talk about work?"

The headphone on Chen Nuo's left was suddenly taken off by someone, and a voice said this.

He took off his eye mask, opened his eyes, and said with some dissatisfaction: "I wasn't pretending to sleep."

Luo Rui smiled and said: "I don't think so. I was just staring at you for ten minutes and noticed your butt kept moving around. Alright, regardless, you're awake now."

Chen Nuo yawned, turned his head, and said to Guli Nazha, who was sitting in the seat on the other side of the plane: "Nazha, get me a cup of coffee."

"Alright, Chen Zong."

Although this was a rented private jet and equipped with a foreign service sister, Chen Nuo was still used to ordering his little assistant around.

After he finished speaking, he turned back, looked at Luo Rui and Qi Yuntian sitting to the side, crossed his legs, and said swaggeringly: "Speak, what do you want to say? Let me hear it."

As the executive representative of Netflix in this cooperation and also the producer of this show, Luo Rui didn't mind the terrible attitude of her nominal subordinate, a certain executive producer.

It was unclear if it was because the cooperation method between the two sides this time could be said to have reshaped the production division system of traditional American dramas.

The role of the executive producer was extremely magnified, with power covering the entire chain of creativity, production, and promotion, while the producer more reflected the platform's strategic control and did not participate in direct project operations, possessing only the final broadcast rights and budget approval rights.

Therefore, strictly speaking, Luo Rui was actually the one who shouldn't be asking about specific matters.

But the woman didn't have any self-awareness about breaking the contract either, looked at the laptop on the table, and said:

"Currently, our company's arrangement for this show is to hope to launch it during the summer slot of July to August next year. That is to say, the production cycle left for our entire team is actually only eight to nine months. This time is actually quite tight for a Hollywood crew. So, I think we'd better finalize the following matters quickly so we can arrange them immediately upon getting off the plane. Now, let me tell you about the plan I just discussed with Chris. First point, determine the filming location..."

"Stop, stop, stop." Chen Nuo raised his hand and said: "Relax, Luo Rui, speak slower. Don't be so anxious, okay? I remind you, what you just said was Hollywood, but where are we filming the TV series? Hong Kong. Anyone with a slight understanding of Hong Kong films knows that when the directors here are at their craziest, they can film a movie in seven days. Nine months? Forget eleven episodes, I even think they could film one hundred and eleven episodes."

Luo Rui turned her head to look at Qi Yuntian, and Qi Yuntian smiled and shrugged his shoulders.

At this time, Guli Nazha brought the coffee over. Chen Nuo took it, said thank you, took a sip, and continued:

"And oh, I want to remind you, when Reed Hastings was still hesitating, we weren't playing around. Didn't Chris tell you? Forget about the filming location; actually, we have already built up the backbone members of the entire team during this period. Executive producer, director, director of photography, costume designer... the core backbone that should be there is almost all there."

As Chen Nuo spoke, he smiled and looked at Luo Rui. "You actually have no need to disturb my sleep, dear Luo Rui. In fact, at this stage, everything for the entire show is already prepared. I mean, everything. I know you are very attentive, but actually, you can completely set your mind at ease now and, like me, take a nap."

"With you?"

Chen Nuo chuckled and took a sip of coffee, as if he had forgotten the vow he made earlier to "keep his pants zipped" completely. Come to think of it, foreign girls weren't within the scope of that vow anyway.

Luo Rui looked at him for a while, suddenly let out a breath, placed her hand on the laptop, and prepared to close it: "Alright, since you say so, then I really will sleep for a while..." But immediately, looking at the laptop screen, she suddenly laughed out loud: "By the way, I saw something fun in the US earlier, I specifically downloaded it, come, let me show you."

Saying this, she turned the laptop around.

"What?"

Chen Nuo leaned over with curiosity.

Luo Rui clicked on a video on the desktop, and it immediately started playing.

Watching it, Chen Nuo's originally relaxed expression slowly began to furrow.

This was an interview video from the famous CBS program "Face the Nation." Two people appeared on screen: one was host Steve Kroft, and the other was Tang Tang Nade.

This video wasn't complete, but it was over ten minutes long. It started with Tang Tang Nade talking incessantly about his campaign platform, with content involving tariffs, Europe, China, etc.

The topic was very serious, but the way he spoke was really hard for people to take seriously. The host clearly didn't take him seriously either, with a half-smile expression on his face the whole time, and the questions he asked felt like they were all teasing.

Luo Rui laughed to the side: "Interesting?"

"A little. When is this video from?"

"Two weeks ago." Luo Rui shrugged. "I heard he got a sum of money from some fool, barely survived the debt crisis, and then he started high-profile activities again."

She rolled her eyes with disdain. "What campaign for President, it's just wanting to sponge off some news heat. If he's lucky, he can get a name before the Republican primary, and then use 'withdrawing from the campaign' to exchange for some conditions, like commercial contracts, political resources, or debt exemption; these are what he really cares about. In the end, all of this is just to make money."

"However, the most interesting thing is actually, listen to this..."

Luo Rui dragged the progress bar a bit, and then turned up the volume on the laptop a little.

"Tang Tang Nade, you've said a lot about China, but I heard you have a good relationship with Chen Nuo. If you succeed, how do you plan to handle your relationship with him?"

Tang Tang Nade was indeed a talented player; there wasn't a hint of embarrassment on his face, and he said a few words while opening and closing his palms.

His answer not only made Luo Rui laugh, but also made Qi Yuntian and Guli Nazha, who were watching together to the side, laugh as well.

Chen Nuo laughed along with them.

While laughing, the thoughts in his mind were like a fairy from beyond the heavens, floating wildly.

If Old Tang really walked the same path as in his past life, then, it's estimated that this question would be asked by reporters countless times in the future.

Just like asking what this BGM is.

And Old Tang, would he also be very serious at the beginning, but later... just "Love's Sustenance, Asking Again About Suicide?"

Speaking of which, if there's a chance, I could introduce Yang Mi to Old Tang.

Both are confident people; they should get along very well.

…………

On December 5, 2011, Milkyway Image boss and director Du Qifeng hosted a banquet at the Fook Lam Moon Restaurant in Causeway Bay to entertain the mainland superstar and the representatives of Netflix, the largest streaming platform in the US, who had come to Hong Kong to prepare for the TV series.

This was absolutely a grand event that made Hong Kong paparazzi boil with excitement, and the entertainment marketing accounts on Sina Weibo also ushered in a carnival of traffic once again.

Before 4 o'clock, cannons had already been set up on the road opposite the restaurant.

Subsequently, the arrival of one superstar and director after another made this place comparable to the scene of the Hong Kong Film Awards, making the trending topic on Weibo that "half of the Hong Kong entertainment circle" had gone there feel like it was stating a fact, rather than bragging like other times.

There were many reasons for such a situation.

The most critical one was that as early as more than two months ago, there was wind in the Hong Kong entertainment circle that Huanxin, in conjunction with Netflix, would be filming a web series in Hong Kong. And then it spread more and more outrageously, more and more exaggeratedly; in a situation where a TV series on TVB had an investment of 10 million Hong Kong dollars at most, and Media Asia, with deep pockets, invested 30 to 50 million Hong Kong dollars in a movie at most, a 10-episode TV series with an average production cost of tens of millions of Hong Kong dollars per episode sounded like a ghost story.

But later, the news that came out from Milkyway Image was really mythology shining into reality, and this time, the stagnant film and television circle in Hong Kong over the past few years was like being thrown into a big firecracker, and all kinds of gods and monsters jumped out.

Chen Nuo saw many new and old friends at the banquet.

Like Carina Lau, Eric Tsang, Chen Kexin, Xu Ke, including Wong Kar-wai, who was busy preparing for "The Grandmaster," also came, but only stayed for ten minutes and left in a hurry after chatting with him for a while.

Besides that, the person he chatted with the most was Du Qifeng, whom he was meeting for the first time but had already called several times and had officially signed a contract to serve as the producer of this show.

Letting Du Qifeng serve as producer wasn't because he borrowed Milkyway Image's ace screenwriter and owed a favor, but because Du Qifeng was really suitable for this position.

What is a producer?

In many movies and TV series in the mainland, producer is just a nominal title, more to attract investment or raise the project's status.

But in the real Hollywood production system, this role is one of the core decision-makers throughout the production, sometimes even more important than the director.

The producer is the artistic commander-in-chief, the bridge between creation and reality, responsible for coordinating the entire team, ensuring that the director's creative concept can be implemented without exceeding the budget or missing the schedule, and also controlling the final artistic quality in post-editing and audio-visual tuning.

It is no exaggeration to say that they are the soul of the project.

The core team of Huanxin's Hong Kong branch this time was exactly that group of "interns" who participated in the production process of Warner Bros.' "Inception" and learned from beginning to end.

They learned the real Hollywood industrial process in that project, and now that they finally had the opportunity to apply what they learned, they naturally wanted to apply the Hollywood production model to film this show in an authentic way—and under this system, the producer's power and importance were greatly improved, and Chen Nuo had to make the final decision himself.

After repeated deliberation, he finally decided to choose Du Qifeng.

Not only because of this person's status in the Hong Kong circle, or because Milkyway Image's Wai Ka-fai and Yau Nai-hoi had participated in the script creation from the beginning, which made the cooperation between the two sides feel like a natural result.

More importantly, as a producer, one needs to control the style of the entire series, and Du Qifeng's aesthetic system was very consistent with the "Eagle Catching Chickens" in his mind.

The cold, restrained, and ensemble-based lens language and atmosphere creation in "The Mission," "Election," and "PTU" were very similar to the style of the original "Squid Game."

When he learned that Du Qifeng had directed TV series on TVB as early as the 1980s and was familiar with the series production process, he dispelled his hesitation—abandoning Chen Kexin, Xu Ke, Wong Kar-wai, and Wu Wu Yusen, and instead choosing Du Qifeng.

To be honest, it still made his heart ache a little.

Chen Kexin's humanistic narrative, Xu Ke's wild imagination, Wong Kar-wai's poetry and blurriness, Wu Wu Yusen's violence and romance, actually made him very curious. If they were allowed to direct, the things they filmed would definitely make him feel refreshed.

But for the sake of safety, Chen Nuo still had to endure the pain of giving up and chose Du Qifeng.

Subsequently, he personally dialed the phone and reported the producer fee of 1 million Hong Kong dollars per episode, and Du Qifeng was also very straightforward, agreeing directly on the phone.

With the joining of Du Qifeng, the remaining things went much more smoothly.

Under Du Qifeng's recommendation, the director of photography was finally finalized as Huang Zhiming, who had served as the photographer for "Running Out of Time" and "Infernal Affairs."

The costume designer was Pu Ruomu, who had cooperated with them in "The Message." Although Teacher Pu had won a Golden Horse for Republic of China costumes, now changing to modern clothing was actually his specialty.

The art director was a choice between Zhang Shuping and the art director of "Infernal Affairs," Tony Au, and finally it was decided to choose Zhang Shuping. He hoped that this "Godfather of Hong Kong Film Aesthetics" style, which combined the temperament of old Hong Kong with modern urban sensibility, would create a more immersive atmosphere.

The sound director invited Mark Lui, who had become popular with "Lust, Caution" and "Hero," to oversee the overall auditory presentation.

The final core team almost included the top power of the entire Hong Kong film and television industry.

It was precisely because of this that Chen Nuo had the confidence to say that sentence to Luo Rui: "Everything is already prepared."

When Du Qifeng came to chat with him, he thought it was Producer Du preparing to talk to him about actor auditions, but he didn't expect Du Qifeng to talk about another matter with a solemn expression.

"You mean, we can't find a suitable studio in all of Hong Kong?"

Du Qifeng smiled bitterly: "That's how it is now. Our show requires a soundproof studio of at least 3,000 square meters with a ceiling height of over 10 meters, but the indoor studios under TVB have a maximum area of only 1,500 square meters, and the old Shaw Brothers factory has long been decommissioned. I also thought about going to the Tseung Kwan O Industrial Estate to rent a large warehouse for renovation, but Hong Kong's approval efficiency is very low; the whole set of reporting, capital verification, and environmental assessment takes three months to start, not counting the subsequent construction time."

"Damn." Chen Nuo couldn't help but glance at Luo Rui.

I saw this niece of the Disney tyrant, in such an occasion, was simply like a fish in water. Her blonde hair was shining under the lights, and the red wine glass in her slender hand was held like a noble girl raising a glass in an oil painting, making the few young actors chatting with her now, like Shawn Yue and others, clearly a bit overwhelmed.

"Then what to do now? What is the solution?" Chen Nuo turned back and asked straight to the point.

Du Qifeng said: "If there is really no ready-made venue, we might only be able to build it ourselves."

"There is a vacant old industrial plot at the junction of Hong Kong and Kowloon in San Po Kong, and the traffic is very convenient. We can temporarily build a super-large studio there, specifically serving this show. But it is estimated that it will cost 30 million Hong Kong dollars to build, which is nearly twice as expensive as renting. Then there is the time, it will take at least a three-month preparation period, which I am afraid will affect the original filming plan."

Chen Nuo's lips moved, and he said a sentence.

Du Qifeng asked: "Nuo Zai, what are you saying?"

"Love's Suicide, Asking Again About Sustenance... Just kidding. Let's go see it together tomorrow."

"Good stuff."

……

……

The next day, Chen Nuo took the entire team, drove three cars, and personally made a trip, turning around all of Hong Kong, and surveyed the several venues mentioned by Du Qifeng on the spot. Soon he found that Du Qifeng really didn't lie to him.

In fact, no one in the world knew better than him what he wanted. Even Pang Ho-cheung and Wai Ka-fai, in the end, were just writing down the conception in his mind.

He was the kind of person who had been in both big and small studios, and didn't need Du Qifeng to explain too much; he knew at a glance—to meet the requirements in his heart, the ready-made studios in Hong Kong now really wouldn't work.

Either too small or too old, it was really possible that they hadn't been upgraded for twenty years.

So, what to do?

Returning from San Po Kong, several producers and the producer decided to work overtime, so they gathered manpower and discussed countermeasures overnight at the Huanxin Hong Kong office building on Man Wa Lane, Sheung Wan.

At this time, the leisure of sleeping on the plane could no longer be seen on Chen Nuo's face; he didn't say much on the way back, making the atmosphere in the car depressed and oppressive.

He opened his mouth, and as his voice fell, the whole room immediately quieted down.

"Then build it ourselves."

In the first sentence, he used English to make a final decision: "We'll build it ourselves."

But the expressions of the dozen or so core members of the production team in the conference room didn't relax because of this. After all, after a day of field visits, everyone actually had psychological preparation for "self-built studio," but what about the problems?

Du Qifeng frowned. He had anticipated this conclusion early on, but the problem was still there: if they really wanted to build the studio themselves, first, where would the money come from? Second, was there enough time?

Chen Nuo looked around the conference room and then slowly said: "Building a studio yourself has several benefits. First, we can customize it completely according to the crew's filming needs, and the effect will be the best. Second, this studio can be used for a long time in the future. When we film the second season, or even other projects in the future, we can continue to use it, saving a lot of repeated rental expenses. Huanxin wants to take root in Hong Kong, not hit a shot and change a place; from a long-term perspective, self-building is actually the most convenient, most economical, and most sustainable way."

"But the disadvantages are also very obvious, just as Director Du said—funds and time."

"We build the studio because of the play, and everything revolves around the play. The funding problem is not difficult to solve; 30 million Hong Kong dollars is not a small amount, but if it exceeds the budget, we will find some excuses to let Netflix add investment; they have already taken out tens of millions of US dollars, so they won't be stingy about this."

Du Qifeng was slightly startled and glanced at Luo Rui. He understood Chen Nuo's meaning, but didn't expect him to say this to her face—in front of the Netflix representative, bluntly saying he wanted to cheat them out of money.

However, the producer opposite—the "blonde beauty" who appeared on the cover of Hong Kong tabloids today—was just listening attentively, without even moving her eyebrows.

Du Qifeng felt a chill in his heart, and had a few more cognitions about the "extraordinary relationship" mentioned by Wai Ka-fai and Yau Nai-hoi.

Chen Nuo paused and continued:

"The final problem is actually only one, and that is time. We originally had a 9-month production cycle, but if we want to build a studio ourselves, by the time we finish and officially start filming, there might only be 6 months, or even 5 months left. With the current method, it is almost impossible to complete a whole season of episodes with quality and quantity in such a short time."

"Next is my solution. I suggest we just go all the way, let Netflix pay a little more, and let us adopt the multi-director system. Xiang Zai, as the main director, will film the first two episodes to set the tone, and then arrange for several directors to film simultaneously."

"The candidates I have thought of so far are Chen Kexin, Xu Ke, Zhang Yimou, Jiang Wen, as well as Wong Kar-wai and Wu Wu Yusen. If there are other suitable candidates, everyone can add them. Let's discuss together again and see who is suitable."

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 446 =====